WELL, that's the first festive row over... now I know it must be Christmas. It was a rare sunny, frosty morning, crisp and fresh, and we went out to get a Christmas tree. He wanted something the size of the tree the Norwegians put in Trafalgar Square each year. I just wanted something that we could get through the sitting room door. We Had Words.

But while we were Having Words, I caught the eye of another woman about ten trees away. She was holding an attractive tree of modest proportions, while her husband was standing by the twin of the giant my husband had chosen.

We grinned at each other in perfect understanding.

Christmas brings people together like that. We may be an increasingly disparate and fragmented society but at this time of year we are all drawn together by common experience. I'd like to think it was the abiding, universal truth of the Christmas message. But actually, it's more likely to be a fellow feeling over the simpler things in life. This is the time of year of shared experiences such as:

l the Christmas tree lights that fuse as soon as you switch them on

l the dreadful office party

l the even more dreadful morning after the office party

l the cards that turn up from long lost friends to whom you haven't sent one _ the day after the last posting date

l working out which family you're spending Christmas with

l pretending you really like sprouts/your sister-in-law/ knickers that play Jingle Bells.

l trying to remember what size slippers your husband's aunty takes

l trying to convince a four-year-old that the sheep three rows back behind the Virgin Mary is A Really Important Part

l queuing to get into the car park/queuing to get out of the car park/queuing to get a train ticket/queuing for the bus that's running instead of the train/queuing for something you can't afford for a child who doesn't want it

l hearing Away In a Manger as if for the first time and trying not to cry

l having to read unbearably smug computerised letters from unbearably smug perfect families

l trying to assemble a computer/doll's house/space station at midnight on Christmas Eve after too much red wine

l being woken three hours later to admire it...

We all get tired and ratty, snap at our partners, or children and wonder if it's all worth it. Well, of course it is. Even the rattiness is part of it really because you, just like the rest of us, are only human. We are all sharing in the same battles, even if it is only trying to find a Playstation 2 or getting the lights to work. Your Christmas probably won't be anything like the ones featured in the glossy magazines _ who'd want such perfection anyway? _ but in among the usual dramas, I hope there are a lot more highs than lows. Happy Christmas.

MADONNA, about to be married in full Scottish splendour, to Guy Ritchie has been married before, of course. But, said a commentator at the weekend, the Vatican would in any case have allowed her an annulment, on the grounds that her first husband, Sean Penn, was "psychologically immature".

Gosh, if a man's psychological immaturity is grounds for annulment, then half...

No, I won't say it. It's Christmas, don't let's be cruel. But all the women out there know exactly what I was going to say, don't you?

WHEN boxers get into the ring, they do so with the specific intention of knocking seven bells out of each other. It's what it's all about.

Now, tragically, Paul Ingle has suffered a blood clot on his brain in a featherweight title fight. Boxing experts and fans might well be concerned and worried over the incident.

But they cannot, in all honesty, pretend to be surprised.

SILLY girl. Claire Swire, a 26-year-old public relations executive, e-mailed her boyfriend with detailed recollection of their sex life. Within minutes, city lawyer Bradley Chait had e-mailed it onto friends and within hours the torrid descriptions were being read by millions of internet users all over the world.

She is, of course, a fool. He is, of course, a rat. But gosh, I bet now they both wish their offices had a ban on private e-mails.

SO now the advert's banned. We shall no longer look at a billboard-size naked Sophie Dahl, her head thrown back in apparent solitary ecstasy as she tries to sell us perfume. I was never quite sure what the advert was trying to prove and the more I thought about it, the less I liked it. Still, now we've had all the fuss...

...Sophie has had a chance to show how much weight she's lost and gained more notoriety _ always useful for a model.

...Yves Saint Laurent have had lots of publicity and added another dash of danger to the ridiculously named Opium.

...The objectors have the satisfaction of proving that protest pays.

So that's all right then.

But what no one's remembered is that the very reason Opium needed such a dramatic campaign was because, well, actually, it doesn't smell very nice. Maybe that's why Sophie was all on her own.

IT has to be a publicity stunt. Chris Evans apparently has a new girlfriend, 18-year-old singer Billie Piper. To celebrate this new love, Chris has bought her a £110,000 Ferrarri. Absolute madness.

And that proves it's just a stunt. Anyone who buys a car like that for an 18-year-old not only has more money than sense, but, more importantly, has no care, concern or fear for her safety. If he really loved her, he would have bought her a nice little Micra, Ka or Yaris, something small and safe and sensible.

But then that wouldn't have made such a good story, would it?